"The S.E.M. Ensemble, as throughout the evening, played with energy and authority, and one may assume the performances were definitive." - New York Times

"Quite possibly it’s because of Ostrava Days business that we’ve yet to learn what Kotik and the S.E.M. Ensemble have in store for their 2017-18 New York season. In one sense, though, the details hardly matter: Kotik has spent a lifetime showing us exactly what he stands for, and what we all have to gain by paying attention." Steve Smith, The Log Journal

...Nothing I've heard an orchestra do in years has been more original, more surprising, and more exquisitely etched at the same time. - Village Voice

"Kotik, an admired experimentalist composer who has been a stalwart on the New York scene for three decades” - The New Yorker

"On Friday night, I heard Mahler's Eighth Symphony in Carnegie Hall... Four nights later, I heard something no less gigantic: Morton Feldman's For Philip Guston, which sent a small complement of musicians into music of vast dimensions.... The whole miraculous passage was superbly realized by Mr. Kotik and his players, whose concentration never faltered through the whole five-hour span." - New York Times

"Both performances [Atlas Eclipticalis and Concert for Piano and Orchestra] demonstrate what committed and intelligent interpreters can do with Cage's blueprints, and how close their dedication can bring the result to the Zen-like inclusiveness that was Cage's ambition. There are many ravishing moments in both works, sudden conjunctions of textures and colours that tease and delight; the arrivals matter not at all, but the journeys are certainly diverting." - BBC Music Magazine

"The S.E.M. Ensemble...had the stamina and devotion to put the music across with a pronounced serenity." - The New York Times

Buoyed by S.E.M.'s meditative concentration, one heard the impression of a suspended sonority slowly revolving. For Philip Guston sounded less like music than aural public sculpture." - Village Voice